Giant Tree Lobsters Uncovered

Balls Pyramid 19km from Lord Howe island in the Tasman Sea

A small colony of Lord Howe Island Stick Insects escaped decimation from 20c British trading ships who crashed on the South Pacific Island that these incredible 'Tree Lobsters' inhabited.  The ships brought with them back rats who devoured almost all but a small colony who survived in isolation and obscurity around one small bush on a nearby island.


Recently uncovered by a couple of Australian scientists, the following is an excerpt from NPR’s Robert Krulwich’s account of the discovery in Six Legged Giant Finds Secret Hideaway, Hides for 80 Years:

"On their way down, on a precarious, unstable rock surface, they saw a single melaleuca bush peeping out of a crack and, underneath, what looked like fresh droppings of some large insect …The only thing to do was to go back up after dark, with flashlights and cameras, to see if the pooper would be out taking a nighttime walk. Nick Carlile and a local ranger, Dean Hiscox, agreed to make the climb. And with flashlights, they scaled the wall till they reached the plant, and there, spread out on the bushy surface, were two enormous, shiny, black-looking bodies. And below those two, slithering into the muck, were more, and more … 24 in all. All gathered near this one plant . . ."


Read MORE and view the INCREDIBLE video of this enormous alienesque creature emerging from its inconceivably small egg:
Six Legged Giant Finds Secret Hideaway, Hides for 80 Years